It may not be the typical fare that we like to feature, but you can’t say this one isn’t a hack. It’s a camp trailer fashioned from the back half of a wrecked Honda Civic, and it’s a pretty unique project.
We don’t know about other parts of the world, but a common “rural American engineering” project is to turn the bed and rear axle of an old pickup truck into a trailer. [monickingbird]’s hacked Civic is similar to these builds, but with much more refinement. Taking advantage of the intact and already appointed passenger compartment of a 1997 Civic that had a really bad day, [monickingbird] started by lopping off as much of the front end as possible. Front fenders, the engine, transmission, and the remains of the front suspension and axle all fell victim to grinder, drill, and air chisel. Once everything in front of the firewall was amputated, the problem of making the trailer safely towable was tackled. Unlike the aforementioned pickup trailers, the Civic lacks a separate frame, so [monickingbird] had to devise a way to persuade the original unibody frame members to accept his custom trailer tongue assembly. Once roadworthy, the aesthetics were tackled — replacing the original interior with a sleeping area, installing electrics and sound, and a nice paint job. Other drivers may think the towing vehicle is being seriously tailgated, but it seems like a comfy and classy way to camp.
Now that the trailer is on the road, what to do with all those spare Civic parts? Sure, there’s eBay, but how about a nice PC case featuring a dashboard gauge cluster?
Here (Latvia) it is explicitly forbidden by law to make trailers out of parts of cars. Only factory made elements meant for trailers are allowed. I suspect it is like that in lots of places around EU.
In the uk you can do this the usual reason is to do a “car and a half” like the Passat below. It’s legal so long as the rules for weight brakes lighting and safety are followed.
Surprisingly, in germany, you’re allowed to do that aswell. I used to read tuning magazines back when i was 16 and there was a feature article on someones car-and-a-half build every now and then.
Are you sure about that. Recent changes in the law mean that you are no longer allowed to make a trailer of any sort unless you get it type approved afterwards and that normally means as much money as buying an off the shelf one. This is one of the reasons that old trailers do not get scrapped, you can mend and repair but you are no longer allowed to make new.
There are rules and then there are rules. Depends when you claim to have made the trailer.
In Australia, using an old Ute(‘pickup’) tub tray to make a trailer was quite common. Most utes when sold are flat tray over here, For many years it was cheaper to import the tub tray, change it and sell it than get it delivered without the tray, so there were huge junkyards of just tub trays that could be brought at near scrap steel prices.
Things have changed, but a lot of the old trailers still exist.
Behold the Slavic engineering!
http://allegro.pl/vw-passat-b5-1-8t-lpg-przyczepka-1-2passat-i7101652227.html#thumb/1
wykop! ;D
Love the use of the original handbrake
Only 12 500,00 Zozzles what is that in real money ?
It’s about 3700 USD.
You know you could’ve just google it up, don’t you?
What the heck is a Google? Let me Bing that.
Tongue weight must be crazy high
This. Fail on that part.
He says 200 lbs in the comments of the Instructable. So not really a problem as long as he has the proper rated hitch and something big enough to pull it around.
He says he have a big truck, he got this professionally inspected, and police inspected at Texas, and passed both inspections.
It won’t be hauling people around, only camping gear, and be used to sleep inside, not travel inside. So, no big concerns…
Says something about Texas, just glad I’m not the one who has to to dodge oncoming traffic down there.
You might be fearful about driving in Kansas then. I’,m sure Texas has annual vehicle inspections, Kansas does doesn’t. For a time Kansas required vehicle safety inspection whenever a used vehicle was sold. That didn’t last long. I guess here it’s a god given right to sell or purchase a death trap of a vehicle.
I thought that as well… then I thought, drop a water tank in behind the axels, put a small kitchenette under the rear hatch, 100 lbs of water behind the rear axle should help, and a kitchen countertop starting at the rear axle and goinig back should help a bit too… nothing particularly heavy in the front half of the car-trailer any more, so just a bit of weight, even just behind the axel, should help a lot.
Protip is to do this with a wagon instead of a hatchback. The additional length past the rear axle will make it easier to balance out for a lighter tongue weight.
Lots of discussion about tongue, or hitch, weight. You’ll also find a disturbing amount of side intrusion metalwork inside the doors of some countries’ CiViCs. Glass is pretty weighty, too.
The majority of pickup bed trailers I have towed where horrible when compared to a purpose manfactured singel exle trailer. IMO that’s because the rear suspension of a pickup is engineer with the fact there will be two more wheels on the vehicle, not a pretty flexible single point at the front. The wort was a trailer made from a Chevy pickup that had the rear coil spring suspension. My assumption that the civic has rear coil springs. I think most accustomed to pulling the typical single axle utility trailer my be tricking the curb at intersections for the first few right hand turns. Yea I know many commercial trailers have wheel u up to the rear, but the leverage car and light truck owner do pull those on daily basis. Not knocking the build, and if the camper suits them great.